Adapting to Change

When I was a kid, my grandparents had a little trailer in Kitty Hawk, NC, which had a huge impact on my interests as a child. In case you didn't know, Kitty Hawk is the location of man's first powered aircraft flight, in December 1903. (Does it seem only fitting that I would be born 80 years later?) Now there is a local museum and a monument erected for tourists to visit. And since we'd visit the beach every summer, it wasn't really out of the way! The track that the brothers used to run their Flyer on before it lifted off was still there to see. The museum even had a wind tunnel to explain how the brothers figured out the "science" of flight and wing warping. The picture above is the Wright brothers flying their Flyer at Kitty Hawk, which is the windiest place in the country (and why they chose that site.)

Do they not see the birds held (flying) in the midst of the sky? None holds them but Allah [none gave them the ability to fly but Allah]. Verily, in this are clear proofs and signs for people who believe (in the Oneness of Allah). 16:79

Some people might take the wrong meaning from this ayah, perhaps, and find it contradictory to the science of flight. But when I read it the first time, as someone who had studied aerodynamics (my original major at college was aerospace engineering) and even piloted a small aircraft, I found it to be an amazing description of flight, and even more amazing of gliding--when you see birds circling around in the air without flapping their wings or anything. Without even powering themselves, they just float along on air that is rising--because hot air rises. So a bird can glide by drifting along air that's rising. And none holds them but Allah. Allah who made the air, controls the sky (including the flow of air)air, and who made the birds to find and use those drafts.

For the uninitiated, flight of airplanes basically works by putting a shape called an airfoil into a stream of air. The airfoil is the cross-section of a wing, by the way. If you start to angle the airfoil upwards, then an area of low pressure appears above it, with an area of high pressure appearing below it. That's what causes the airfoil to rise. This is an easy concept to experiment with--hold your hand out of the car while driving. You can hold your hand straight, and parallel to the ground, then start to angle it upwards.

And then, try curving your hand slightly, and notice the increased effect of the pressure change. I.e., there's more pressure building in the curve of your hand, pushing your hand up. That's "wing warping." If you ever get the chance, observe the shape of a bird's wing, how it is curved slightly underneath.

The other thing that the Wright Brothers were able to do was power their glider, to make it actually fly instead of just glide, and they did that by using propellers (which were known for use under water, on ships) that were adapted for the air, to basically propel the aircraft forward. The motion of the aircraft caused the wings to be moving through the air, and then the buildup of pressure below the wing with a pressure drop above the wing, which allowed the aircraft to take flight.

A century later, I sat in the pilot's seat of a small aircraft using pretty much the same technology--albeit of different materials. A propeller was driving the aircraft forward, and the wings of the craft had pieces on the wings used to effectively "warp" them by changing their shape (or the way air flows over.)

What made me want to use this photograph for this quote is knowing that it must take some serious guts to get up on a fragile piece of wood and fabric that is supposed to all on its own lift off from the ground. If you're the pilot, you can't go up being afraid of failing, even though you don't exactly have flight experience to count on. You have to try it out, and when you come down...? Then you're a pilot!

A Book of Signs

Subhanallah.

Surah Yunus begins thus:

Alif. Laam. Raa. Tilka ayatu alkitabi alHakeem.

I don't know very much Arabic, but I know every word in this sentence above. It starts with three miracle letters, the meaning of which is with Allah alone, then it says what means "These are the ayaat of the wise book." Ayaat is one of those beautiful words associated with the Qur'an that I prefer to use, rather than its common faulty translations. All the translation I looked up for this ayah translated the word ayaat (which is, btw, the plural of ayah) to mean "verses."

The Qur'an is divided into 114 chapters called suwar-->the plural of surah, though I'll just say surahs from now on. Each surah is further divided into enumerated ayaat. In a poem, that might be called verses, but as the Qur'an is not poetry the word does not quite apply. Another mean of the word ayah (or plural ayaat) is a sign (signs.)

So would it not also be correct to translate the ayah as "These are the signs of the wise book?" I don't know--I'm NOT by any standard whatsoever qualified to translate the Qur'an. I just love that every single "verse" (poor translation of the Qur'an) is actually a "sign."

So the Qur'an is a book filled with signs. One after another, after another filling pages upon pages and preserved in the hearts and memories of the Muslims. I love that. Sometimes I mention to people that there was really a single ayah in the Qur'an that took me out of Christianity--it was the sign for me that pointed me towards Islam. The guidance. One ayah.

I tell people that ayah all the time (especially Christians) but it certainly doesn't have the same effect as it did for me. Not that it has to. But when I hear about Sahaba (Companions of the Prophet Muhammad saws) embracing Islam after hearing the Qur'an--even just a little bit of it--it doesn't shock me. Because the Qur'an is a book of guidance, is it not?

This is the Book (the Quran), whereof there is no doubt, a guidance to those who are Al-Muttaqun. 2:2

So the Qur'an is guidance.

We have indeed sent down (in this Quran) manifest Ayaat. And Allah guides whom He wills to a Straight Path. 24:46

And the Qur'an is signs. Muhsin Khan in his translation after the word "Ayaat" writes in parentheses: proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, lawful and unlawful things, and the set boundries of Islamic religion, etc. that make things clear showing the Right Path of Allah. So many meanings encompassed by the word Ayaat. So beautiful.

I mean to say, if I could summarize so far, that the Qur'an is a book of signs, and guidance from Allah.

I was reminded of this simple but amazing fact when listening to a conversion story a few days ago. (Part 1, Part 2) The brother explains how he was reading the Qur'an and stopped to ask Allah for a sign. Then he mentions that the next verse he read was directed at people, or describing the people who ask for signs. I couldn't find what verse specifically he was talking about (and I'm not the first to ask) but we know that the Qur'an mentions people who ask about signs, and it also mentions the signs obvious for anyone to see--but which are really only signs for the people of knowledge.

Sometimes people will desire to increase their faith, their iman, and the answer for that seems pretty clear--study the proofs, study the signs, study the Qur'an.

Adversity

I know sometimes when I am faced with a huge obstacle, I recently tended to just turn away from it, and give up--sometimes before even starting. I totally lost my drive, my motivation. I would turn my back on something because I thought it was just too hard, and so I'd fail without ever even starting.

So this quote says a lot to me--that I should try because I could succeed. It's worth noting however that success is from Allah. When thinking of an example, what came to my mind was the story of Moses talking to Pharaoh--it is probably the most oft-told story about Moses, that he led the Children of Israel out of slavery in Egypt. Amazing. And if you look at the beginning (as in Surah Taha) of his task, when faced with the command from Allah to go to Pharaoh, he starts off by asking for help from Allah.

Here is his du'a (Muhsin Khan translation):

[Musa (Moses)] said: "O my Lord! Open for me my chest (grant me self-confidence, contentment, and boldness).
And ease my task for me;
And make loose the knot (the defect) from my tongue, (i.e. remove the incorrectness from my speech)
That they understand my speech,
And appoint for me a helper from my family,
Harun (Aaron), my brother;
Increase my strength with him,
And let him share my task (of conveying Allah's Message and Prophethood),
That we may glorify You much,
And remember You much,
Verily! You are of us Ever a Well-Seer." (Taha 25-35)

This is one beautiful du'a that any da'ee should know, and even pray before going out to talk to people about Islam. It starts by asking for confidence--which seems to be the first requirement for a person going out on a mission. Not to be confused with arrogance, a certain amount of confidence is necessary to overcome prior despondency and rouse the person to action. And then Moses asks for the task, which in his case is going to talk to Pharaoh, be made easy. Remember that Allah will not try us with something greater than we can bear, but I guess we learn from this du'a that we can also ask Allah to make certain things easy for us. I recall asking Allah to make Islam easy for me very often, especially after wearing hijab and I feared that it would become too difficult. But it didn't--it was easy.

Then Moses asks Allah to be able to speak clearly, which we understand was because of some speech impediment. But since any of us can become "tongue-tied" when speaking about anything, including Islam, it's especially worthwhile to ask Allah to make it easy for us to be understood by our audience.

And then Moses asks for even more help--that his brother can go with him and help him!

Moses didn't say here that this task was just too hard, and he didn't make excuses either, before Allah. He acknowledged his own weaknesses and asked Allah for help. Beautifully the du'a ends by showing the purpose of striving for the objective in the first place, the reason for asking Allah for help and for obeying Allah, which is to glorify Allah and remember Allah. So Allah answered his du'a. The next ayah reads: Allah said: "You are granted your request, O Musa (Moses)! (Taha 36.) And Allah helped him, and what might have seemed a tremendous challenge became what we can call a truly great success of Moses, because he was helped by Allah.

Another example that came to my mind, about fierce enemies becoming strong allies was the example of 'Umar ibn al-Khattab. A man who even harbored murderous intentions toward the Prophet (saws) after reading the Qur'an (according to reports, by reading from Surah Taha which I was just talking about) became softened towards Islam and became one of its strongest supporters.


So what can we learn from this? Don't make excuses--Moses did not make excuses--but try to find a way to accomplish the objective, by seeking help with Allah. Instead of viewing obstacles as dead ends, find a solution and ask Allah for help. Like Moses did not see his speech impediment as a reason to abandon the responsibility Allah had given him, he just asked Allah for help. And that's exactly what we should do.

Anything good is from Allah. Mistakes are my own, so any corrections are appreciated.

Balance

The quote on top of the image is from a site I found with tips for "Self-Development." As Muslims we should all be striving to better ourselves, and that means in our deen and as a part of society. It's especially important now that we tackle the responsibilities facing us as an ummah, and rise to meet the challenges that await us.

I'm trying to work on improving myself, so inshaaAllaah I will be reading different materials on leadership and development and also on Islam, and trying to relate them. As part of my process of learning and internalizing what I've learned, I will try inshaaAllaah to share these things on my blog, under the tag Personal Development, of which this is the first post. (I would call it 'Self-Development' but I don't want it to sound like the suggestion is to develop a person's nafs. If anyone has a better idea for a tag, please let me know.)

The first post, then, is about balance.

It's popular today for people to talk about balance--achieving balance between all their aspirations and obligations so they don't fail in either.

Abu Hurairah (May Allah be pleased with him) reported: The Prophet (PBUH) said, "The religion (of Islam) is easy, and whoever makes the religion a rigour, it will overpower him. So, follow a middle course (in worship); if you can't do this, do something near to it and give glad tidings and seek help (of Allah) at morn and at dusk and some part of night". [Al-Bukhari].

Following a middle course is what balance means. Islam does not mean that we observe only our spiritual obligations and totally neglect our worldly lives. We live in this world, while striving for the next world, so we need to be aware of the rights that others have over us--the rights of our Lord, the rights of our families, the rights of our bodies--and respect those rights.

In the Seerah class I took a couple months ago, we learned a little bit about Abraham, and were able to draw a lesson about balance from it. In fact, we can learn priorities from his story in the Qur'an. First we can look at people today and see what their priorities tend to be--self first, then family, and then religion. Right? Sometimes people even say "number one" when talking about themselves, indicating that even the society understands that a person prioritizes himself above all--and then he might place his family. Maybe if the person is married or children, these goals will be intertwined, but last of all comes the religion, and obligations before God.

In Islam, the priorities are that the deen comes first, the worship of Allah. Then comes families, followed by our physical needs. You can look at the du'a made by Abraham in the Qur'an, in Surah Ibraheem (14):

35 And (remember) when Ibrahim (Abraham) said: "O my Lord! Make this city (Makkah) one of peace and security, and keep me and my sons away from worshipping idols.

36 "O my Lord! They have indeed led astray many among mankind. But whoso follows me, he verily is of me. And whoso disobeys me, - still You are indeed Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.

37 "O our Lord! I have made some of my offspring to dwell in an uncultivable valley by Your Sacred House (the Ka'bah at Makkah); in order, O our Lord, that they may perform As-Salat (Iqamat-as-Salat), so fill some hearts among men with love towards them, and (O Allah) provide them with fruits so that they may give thanks.

There is another similar du'a in Surat al-Baqarah, (2:126-129) which is the du'a made when Abraham is leaving his wife and child in the valley--it's interesting because the request for provision is mentioned before belief, but Abraham is actually only requesting the provision for those who believe in the first place. The du'a quoted above is after Ishmael has grown up and Abraham has visited him again in Makkah. (Chronology determined by the statement "make this a safe city" vs. "make this city safe," a subtle difference implying that in the latter case the city has been established.) The city has been established and so Abraham requests that he and his progeny be protected from shirk.

So we can get an idea for priorities here, but also understand that everything needs to be in balance.

To close, I will quote a statement from the instructor of that seminar on the Seerah, that loosely paraphrases a hadith recorded by Ibn Majah, at-Tabarani, and al-Bayhaqi, which can be read here.

Whoever's concern is the dunya, Allah will make his affairs disperse and will put poverty between his eyes. And nothing will come from the dunya except what Allah has written for him. But whoever's concern is the hereafter, Allah will gather all his affairs--put barakah (blessing) in his time, he can be focused--and will enrich his heart, that he will feel rich, content and not poor, and the dunya will come whether looking for it or not.

So the point of this post is that we need to have balance in our daily lives, which comes from prioritizing our efforts for the Hereafter. And the beauty of Islam is that it is balanced, and attending to the rights of others on us is prescribed as is attending the rights of Allah.

If there are any mistakes in this post, they are my own, and I pray that someone will correct them.

Socks and Shoes

Did you know that you might be able to wipe over your socks or shoes in wudu' instead of washing the whole foot?

If you put the socks/shoes on while you had wudu' in the first place, and if they aren't impure in the first place, and if you haven't been wiping over them for more than a day (or three days if you're traveling), and they aren't so thin that you can see the color of the skin beneath them, and you're supposed to wipe the top, not the bottom.

(If you're not sure about the rulings on wiping over socks, Islamqa.com has plenty of answers about it, if you do a search on "socks." Usually all the fatwas are backed up with proof.)

Now, picture a child, maybe 10-12 years old, making wudu' beside you. The child is wearing flip-flops. Not socks, or shoes, but flip-flops. And when it comes time to wash the feet, the child instead of washing the foot, she just touches the bottom of the flip-flop sole with a finger.

Does that seem like an acceptable way to make wudu'? I didn't think so.

So I mentioned this to her, explaining that she should wash her feet. And she countered by saying that it was permissible to wipe over shoes and socks which is what she was doing. So I replied that it is permissible of course to wipe over socks or shoes if one has wudu' but she wasn't wearing socks or shoes, she was wearing flip-flops that completely exposed her foot, so she couldn't just wipe her flip-flop sole to avoid the laborious process of wiping her feet.

Anyway, the whole event kind of made me wonder who taught her how to make wudu' in the first place, and why she thought that it would be okay to tap the back of her flip-flop. She had learned that it was permissible to wipe over the socks, but hadn't learned the rulings about it to apply them properly.

I wonder how many of us have this problem--that we've only learned something partially and so we implement it incorrectly? This is why it is important to study our deen, even if we think we know it, even if we think we learned it as children. We might be making little mistakes that go unnoticed.

And I'll recommend islamqa.com if anyone has questions about rulings on wiping over the socks.

Miss me?

Everybody has the same number of hours in a day. The same number of minutes. The difference is how we choose to use those minutes.

I could choose to meander around the web, browsing semi-interesting articles on subjects I find fascinating, I could sit on the sofa playing computer games or watching TV, I could walk to the park to fly a kite, and I could focus intently on schoolwork, for once.

Over the last few weeks, I decided to focus on schoolwork. It was incredibly stressful, so while I was studying I didn't devote any time to blogging, or even reading blogs. (My Google reader log has expanded to over 150 unread posts.)

And I guess I got a lot done. But I still have a lot left to do, including finishing a project well past its deadline. And there's a lot I didn't get done--my grandfather passed away just two weeks ago (inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi rajioon), and I wasn't able to attend the funeral. He was 91, and I've seen him only once in 8 years. And I think that has been a blessing, that I didn't see him deterioate with Alzheimer's until he couldn't recognize anyone, that I didn't see him go blind, or wither away as he did in the last few months.

And as I sit here thinking about it, I feel the necessity of da'wah bearing down upon me. At times I know it's hard enough just worrying about myself, and what I will be held to account for on the Day of Judgment. But when I remember that the Prophet (saws) was not allowed to pray for his uncle, or for his mother... I just don't know what I'll be able to feel about my own parents when their time is up, knowing as I do what might be waiting for them.

Twenty-four hours. One thousand four hundred forty minutes. Time keeps ticking, and I have no shortage of worries to fill it with.

Favoritism

One thing that I learned at the Shepherd's Path seminar I went to a few months back was that Muhammad (saws) used to treat each of his Companions like they were his favorite. For instance, Abdullah bin 'Amr bin al-'As said that whenever the Prophet (saws) would look at him, he would smile, which made him think that he was the favorite of the Prophet (saws).

To test his theory, one day he asked the Prophet (saws) if he was better than Abu Bakr, but the Prophet (saws) responded that Abu Bakr was better. And then he asked if he was better than 'Umar, but the Prophet (saws) told him that 'Umar was better.

Then he realized that this was the way that the Prophet (saws) was towards everyone.

The lesson was that we should treat all our brothers and sisters in Islam this way--like they are our favorite person to be around. And honestly, it's a real treat to be around someone who treats you that way.

Image a person who smiles whenever he sees you. Or whenever she sees you, if you're a sister. A person who rushes to hug you, and greets you like you were the person they'd been looking for. Every single time they see you. It's a different kind of favoritism--not favoring one person over everyone else, but making everyone to feel as if they are your favorites.

People love that kind of attention--it's true. Hearing that story about 'Abdullah bin 'Amr bin al-'As puts it into a new perspective, thinking about how the Prophet (saws) acted around his Companions, and why they loved him so much.

Ups and Downs

Imagine:

Your arms and legs are outstretched, holding on fiercely to the side of a cliff. You can feel sweat dripping down the back of your neck, as you try to climb the rock face: one foot, one hand at a time. You could let go--and fall down, perilously down--it wouldn't be a good idea. There's a fire down there. A burning, angry fire, waiting to catch you if you let go, or if you lose your grip, or lose your focus. Climbing upwards is harder. There is no enemy upwards--only safety. But you have to keep climbing. Too tired? Stuck where you are? You don't want to stay there, because that fire below you? It's rising, like lava.

Maybe life doesn't seem that way, when you hit the snooze button for fajr. It doesn't seem like you just lost your footing a bit. Maybe taking off a scarf doesn't seem like slipping down the face of the cliff a ways. But I think it is like that. Climbing up isn't easy. Getting up early to pray isn't going to be easy at first. Carving out time for Qur'an instead of video games--might not be easy. Each time you raise your foot and pull yourself upwards, you're getting further from the fire.

Until you slow down--until you let go of the practices you've added to help get you up the cliff. And then the fire starts keeping up. You can't stay still. You must keep moving, up, higher and higher. It means adding more, doing more, avoiding complacency. You have to push yourself--pull yourself, constantly, to get to the top, and to avoid the fire.

Learning Foresight and Hindsight

Today in my senior design class we had an interesting activity--Q&A with the department head. Strictly speaking it wasn't all that important to attend, and looking back I might have better spent my time working on my projects which are due next week. But since I did go, I started thinking about some perspectives of other students.

At my university, there are a few general education requirements for all students, of all degrees--and they are humanities courses. So engineering students must take at least this number of liberal arts classes from a given list. In order to matriculate into the degree program, it is necessary for students to take a number of basic science and math classes also. In my department, completion of the degree requires taking a certain number of mandatory classes, a certain number of departmental electives, and a small number of "technical electives" which are classes in other departments that are useful on a particular exam engineers need to take for licensure.

It just so happens that in my degree, the number of departmental elective requirements is the same as the number of general humanities requirements. One student brought that up, and he honestly hated this idea that he had to take these courses (humanities) which he insisted would not help him at all in his career. He wanted to take only engineering/technical classes, and not waste his time, so to speak, with classes like history or literature which didn't contribute anything to his career aspirations.

I, on the other hand, fully enjoyed my non-technical classes. I even took extra ones because I enjoyed the subject matter so much, and might have even adopted a minor if I had the time to do it, and weren't so late in my degree already. I've also found that what I've learned in those classes helped me grow as a person far more than any technical class. And I think I care about that a little more.

The department head agreed with me, actually, telling the student that the classes he took himself when he was undergrad in psychology helped him in his job (as dept. head) more than any technical class, and that the skills one can acquire in them are universal, unlike technical skills which are more specific.

He also gave the example of students who had graduated already and were in industry--there was only one class they found to be useful at all, which was senior design. The logic there is that senior design prepares them (or intends to) for the "real world" of industry, and the design process. Whereas other classes are "pencil pushing" and theoretical only.

I guess I'm more of a pencil-pusher type. I don't intend to go into industry, I hate senior design, and I loved the mathematical classes I took, more so than the design-oriented, and as I mentioned before, I liked the non-technical classes, too. When I started college, I never would have pictured myself where I am now, but I'm not disappointed with what I have learned--I really wish I could have learned more. While I am looking forward to graduation and finishing my degree, there is a part of me that wants to continue learning. And I don't mean learning something specific, but just learning in general.

Brainwashing

It's a pretty common (and as weak as it is common) attack on myself on the Catholic forum where I sometimes post, for someone to claim that I am brainwashed. After all, according to the point of view of some more angry intolerant types, I converted to the Dark Side. I mean, I am preferring the rights of women in Islam (which they consider barbaric and medieval) to those of American women, for instance. But in so many ways I prefer Islam to American culture or law, leading people to accuse me of being brainwashed.

But when it comes to brainwashing, these videos are very insightful. I came across them a few days ago over at Egyptian Gumbo, and was incredibly impressed. I hope others can take a look and see things that maybe weren't so obvious before.

Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVhW8l5rKi4&feature=related
Part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHQ3u-8K7e8
Part 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YoLG6Iw_pU

Basically they show how Fox News (especially Sean Hannity) goes about trying to program people's brains (NLP is neurolinguistic programming) to think a certain way.